Letter to the editor regarding the article ‘EFSA’s toxicological assessment of aspartame: was it even-handedly trying to identify possible unreliable positives and unreliable negatives?’

Table 1 Studies not indicating adverse effects (‘negative’ studies)^a versus studies indicating possible adverse effects (‘positive’ studies)^a

	Number of studies identified	Treated as reliable	Treated as unreliable
Studies not indicating adverse effects (‘negative’ studies)^a
Millstone and Dawson^b	81	62 (77%)	19 (23%)
EFSA^c	78	51 (65%)	27 (35%)
Studies indicating possible adverse effects (‘positive’ studies)^a
Millstone and Dawson^b	73	0 (0%)	73 (100%)
EFSA^c	37	21 (57%)	16 (43%)

^a Only primary sources of information relevant to the risk assessment process were included by EFSA in the analysis
^b Interpretation by Millstone and Dawson of the way how the ANS Panel had judged studies as reliable or not reliable
^c Interpretation by EFSA of the way how the ANS Panel had judged studies as reliable or not reliable. The criteria are described in the text, and information on the individual studies is detailed in [6]

ISSN: 2049-3258